Mom pops dentures on TikTok, goes viral for reducing stigma
Explore More
Oh, snap.
A New York mom of four put her money where her mouth is. She and her pearly whites are hitting jaw-dropping heights on TikTok after she dropped more than $16,000 on snap-in dentures after suffering tooth loss and decay during pregnancy.
“I told myself when I went through this that there was not going to be a single person that could say a damn thing to me that’d make me feel bad about it,” asserted Alicia, 36, in a video that’s amassed over 1.6 million views.
In a post that caught over 21.7 million digital eyes, the curvy brunette wipes off all of her makeup, peels off her eyelashes and pops out her dentures — revealing her completely toothless mouth and the drilled implant screws in her gums.
Alicia began losing her teeth after giving birth to her first daughter, Katie, at 21.
“One of my eye teeth just broke right out [in a McDonald’s hamburger], and I was so freaking embarrassed,” she explained in a YouTube confessional.
“I had just married my husband, we just had our first baby. This man married me with perfect teeth … And then the next year his wife is missing a front [tooth].”
Owing to years of avoiding the dentist — due to a traumatic childhood experience — as well as failing to maintain a healthy lifestyle, Alicia’s body had stripped nutrients from her teeth to nourish the baby during gestation.
“During pregnancy, I don’t think I ate properly. I wasn’t as healthy as I should have been,” she admitted.
“So the baby had to strip things out of my body that I didn’t know I didn’t have … Mostly calcium from [my] teeth.”
Nearly 60 to 75% of pregnant women suffer dental disease due to changing hormones during pregnancy, per the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. If not treated, the issues can cause inflammation, infection and tooth loss.
And Alicia’s dental issues worsened while she was pregnant with her second daughter, Bea, at 24.
“After my second pregnancy, my teeth were freaking rocked,” Alicia lamented, noting that she and her husband, Josh, couldn’t afford the costly dental treatments that would replenish her toothless smile at the time.
Their insurance wouldn’t cover the cost of the procedures either.
But they scraped together enough money for full restoration surgery, which boasted a price tag of $10,000 and meant she had to go to the dentist every week for an entire year.
She went on to welcome two more daughters, Mara-Lyn and Amzie. And with them came more dental disasters — some that rendered her restoration surgery null and void.
So, at 34, Alicia finally opted for snap-in dentures. The top row cost her $9,600 and the bottom $7,300.
“When [my dentist] told me I could sleep in [the snap-in dentures], and that I would never have to go without my teeth, I was sold,” she told BuzzFeed.
“It was the scariest thing I have ever done, but I knew it could be the best decision I ever made.”
Now Alicia uses her digital platforms to promote denture positivity and to dissemble the stigma of suffering tooth loss.
“We don’t have to hate ourselves for needing dentures, no matter what the reason,” she encouraged.
“We have the power to make this decision the best thing we ever did for ourselves.”
ncG1vNJzZmimqaW8tMCNnKamZ2Jlf3J7j21mbGhforyuec%2Bop6xllJq7tcHRnqpmp55iwaq306iiZp%2BfmsBuwsirmKVllqS%2Fbr7EnaycoZ6cerTAyKCkmmc%3D